1. Field of the Invention
The invention is related to the embossing of flexible thermoplastic reinforced composites and their manufacture. The invention is related particularly to fabrics used for tents, awning, casual furniture, signage, automotive, healthcare, and the like where the look and feel of natural cloth-like fabrics is desirable.
2. Description of the Related Art
The majority of the synthetic fabrics that attempt to imitate natural cloth-like characteristics that are used by businesses in the marketplace are dyed acrylic fabric, polyvinyl chloride or other thermoplastic compounds. The weakness of the dyed acrylic fabrics is that they lack adequate flame resistance, water proofness and other characteristics typically attributed to thermoplastics polymers such as polyvinyl chloride, polyurethane, polyethylene, polypropylene and other similar polymers. However, these other thermoplastic polymers lack the aesthetic look and feel of woven dyed acrylic and natural cloth fabrics because they can only be texturized on one side (face) of the composite. Alternatively, a print pattern may also be used on one or both sides of the composite to imitate natural cloth-like fabric. In all cases, such resurfacing in an attempt to create the illusion of embossing and texturizing, without actually creating the surface embossing and texturizing, inadequately mimics the natural woven product.
Historically, industry has achieved the characteristics and aesthetics of natural cloth-like fabrics by one of three mechanisms:
(1) Traditional weaving of natural or synthetic yarns which also may be dyed or coated with a thermoplastic polymer.
(2) Use of a metal embossing cylinder to emboss and texturize the surface of a thermoplastic material to create a surface on one of the synthetic flexible thermoplastic material surfaces to attempt to imitate the appearance of a natural cloth-like fabric.
(3) Use of a metal embossing cylinder to empress and texturize the surfaces of a thermoplastic material to create a surface on the face side of the flexible synthetic thermoplastic material surfaces and the use of a printed thermoplastic material on the reverse side to imitate the face side embossed texturized surface to attempt to imitate the appearance of a natural cloth-like fabric.
The above-described processes suffer from one or more of the following limitations. When a process is employed to mimic natural cloth like appearance, the process fails to provide the desirable additional characteristics including but not limited to high flame resistance, water-proof, mildew and fungal resistance, stability when exposed to ultraviolet light, color fastness, strong, light weight, conformable, dimensionally stable, and suitable for sewing welding and fabrication by various means common in industry. When a process is employed to provide the desirable characteristics of including but not limited to high flame resistance, water-proof, mildew and fungal resistance, stability when exposed to ultraviolet light, color fastness, strong, light weight, conformable, dimensionally stable, and suitable for sewing welding and fabrication by various means common in industry, the process fails to provide the natural cloth-like appearance. In both cases, the resulting product suffers in either un-natural appearance or inadequate performance. An additional limitation is that this undesirable one-sided product has limited useful application due to complications and utility arising from the dissimilar nature of the face to reverse surfaces.